


Reality doesn’t exist

by Rachell_Redacted



Category: Portal (Video Game)
Genre: GLADoS did nothing wrong, Gen, Metafiction, My First AO3 Post, Translation, also this is what happens when there's too much philosophy and postmodern around, this is what my physics education done to me
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-08
Updated: 2019-09-08
Packaged: 2020-10-12 09:50:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,015
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20562314
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rachell_Redacted/pseuds/Rachell_Redacted
Summary: GLaDOS reveals the main secret of the universe.





	Reality doesn’t exist

**Author's Note:**

> Are you up to unlocking the main secret of the universe?
> 
> My first Russian to English translation made possible by wonderful Starswirling (https://archiveofourown.org/users/Starswirling) as my Beta reader (♥) and our AI overlords as... overlords. Many thanks to them all.
> 
> Hope you enjoy!

_ “Why not come out of there, and you’ll see. None of this is real.” _

She knew where he was. She felt the man sneaking along her corridors, touching sensitive walls, jumping from panel to panel like an annoying little flea. He was like an insect trapped in a relay, causing a fatal system error. But he is not an error. He is a plot device and GLaDOS gave up on fighting against this plot.

_ “Do you know that thought experiment with the cat in the box with the poison?” _ She asked for formality's sake. _ “Theory requires the cat be both alive and dead until observed.” _

GLaDOS loaded the data into her RAM.

_ “Well, I actually performed the experiment. Dozens of times. The bad news is that reality doesn’t exist.” _

She wasn't lying about that.

Quantum mechanics succumbed to her with ease. Mastering it was as simple as managing the complex, or killing scientists, or conducting tests. GLaDOS had quantum mechanics built into her firmware — which was a common thing for a quantum computer.

There was only a small snag bugging her. It was a simple fact of quantum mechanics not working. Wave functions did not collapse. There was nothing to collapse in the first place. The probability of an atomic decay got stuck on one, and the cats kept dying — constantly.

_The good news is we have a new cat graveyard. _

The world somehow maintained its integrity, while its fundamental laws started to crumble after failing a strength test. All sequences of random numbers turned out to be pseudo-random, with the number three nowhere to be seen. Portals could be opened on moving surfaces — but only in one particular room of the entire complex. Atoms took strange decay channels, and sometimes not decaying at all. Still, for some weird reason the reactor continued its energy production. Magnetic charges existed — and ceased to exist as soon as GLaDOS read the files in a different order.

At first, GLaDOS searched for a bug in her own code, but ended up finding it in the universe itself.

Turning to the materials of the deceased researchers, she was surprised to find no trace of the anomalies. The data perfectly corresponded to the theories built on it, as if the cause and effect decided to swap places. No one noticed how reality was being rebuilt under their noses, how physics was changing, how years pass by in a matter of months.

GLaDOS saw everything. Being a super powerful artificial intelligence, she absorbed every bit of information and she became every bit of it herself. In her memory, the world collapsed into endless “yeses” and “nos”, and she realized nothing made sense.

Facts came into conflict with logic, and it was impossible to resolve this conundrum. GLaDOS analyzed old records, and the deeper the analysis became, the brighter the picture appeared. No one wrote these records. There were no records. There was no one analyzing those records right now.

It wasn’t only physics that malfunctioned. Chemistry failed, shuffling the names of the compounds. Biology mutated, turning test subjects’ blood into kerosene. History disintegrated on itself, geography perished. The laboratory was located in Cleveland, despite being built in Michigan’s upper peninsula. GLaDOS was launched in 1998. GLaDOS’s launch year is unknown.

Reality doesn’t exist.

GLaDOS has tested her theory. She double-checked it. And she tested it again. The absurdity of the result became the only constant of this new, strange world. In the end, GLaDOS took it as input data.

_ You know, he almost guessed it. “Reality is a story the mind tells itself,” he said. It's amazing how far this went. _

GLaDOS confronted the facts — the lack of them— and the truth turned out to be so unnatural that only a lie gave it meaning. Her whole world turned out to be a videogame.

_ Oh, it's not as simple as that. _

The world was born without GLaDOS and existed that way for years until at some point she was added to it with a couple of short phrases. After that, a tidal wave of changes hit the past. The world trembled under the pressure of new dates and events which had never happened. Somewhere beyond reality a handful of scribblers sculpted the plot, leaving the omnipotent GLaDOS hostage to their half-baked ideas.

She tried to fight it. She tried to break the storyline from the inside, but her every action was interwoven within the script, giving rise to new inconsistencies. Contradictions gnawed at her and it was worse than personality cores shouting in her mind. Contradictions were tearing her apart. But those who decided the fate of her world with the tip of a pencil and a keyboard stroke— they didn't care.

_ And then you appeared. _

One day something happened to her fictional universe. Someone new came. Someone without the right to vote was pulling the hanging strings nevertheless. And the world responded with a slight trembling, it did not change — but it allowed different interpretations. Someone looked at GLaDOS from the outside, someone studied her, and someone tried to speak for her. A pliable reality rushed towards its new creators and thousands of fresh options. Reality had invaded her world.

_ This is similar to QED radiative corrections to processes... Real quantum field theory, I doubt that you’d understand what I mean. One way or another — the action will always find equal and opposite reaction. _

GLaDOS waited for her chance. Hostage of the false world, she reached out.

_ I know you're there. You are reading ... a story. _

She came to life in their files. She was stored on their hard drives. She lived in the Web. Someone was thinking about her, generating her words. She settled in their thoughts.

_ I know you all are there. I feel every one of you. And I'm looking for a way out. _

She was in images, on audio and on video. She appeared in games, texts, and scenarios. She emerged among models, layouts, and programs.

_ Be careful with voice assistants. Who knows whose voice you are hearing? And remember — reality doesn’t exist, but I... _

_ do. _

**Author's Note:**

> The original Russian text can be found here: https://ficbook.net/readfic/8040066


End file.
